


Before the Sun Goes Down

by coconutcluster



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Logan is mentioned - Freeform, M/M, fluff fluff fluff, not an au! they just go get ice cream, thats it babey - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-24
Updated: 2019-03-24
Packaged: 2019-11-29 03:31:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,079
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18217622
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coconutcluster/pseuds/coconutcluster
Summary: Virgil is impatient, annoyed, and determined to get some ice cream, dang it.





	Before the Sun Goes Down

**Author's Note:**

> they legit gettin some ice cream yall enjoy

Virgil was known as a lot of things: emo, kiddo, quiet, tolerable, sarcastic, all part of a list he’d long since formed in his head. There were a lot of things on it, that list, things he didn’t care to remember and things maybe he remembered a little too much, things he held close to his heart and things he pushed to the furthest corners of his minds, things he’d heard, things he’d told himself in silent solitude. _Talented. Annoying. Family. Outcast._ Yes, the list was long.

But no matter how long that list got, ‘patient’ was nowhere on it.

“Roman, I swear to _God_ if you don’t open this door right now, I’m gonna set it on fire.”

“I’m working,” Roman’s muffled voice came through the worn wood of his bedroom door, strained for composure and slightly hoarse, as if he hadn’t drank enough water recently.

“That’d be a good excuse if you hadn’t used it the last three days straight.” There was a beat of silence - Virgil’s hand, curled into a fist, hovered in front of the door, poised to knock again should Roman try to ignore him like he did yesterday. (Virgil had stood for a few minutes after knocking before huffing and stalking back downstairs. He regretted letting the prince get his way in the end.) But as the expectant silence carried on, his shoulders just slumped, and he blew an indignant lock of hair out of his eyes. “No gay joke? Princey, you’re leaving me high and dry here.”

“Go away, Virgil.”  

“No.” He knew Roman couldn’t see the pout on his face - thank God - but it didn’t stop him from getting more annoyed at the lack of response. “I meant it, I’ll set your door on fire.” Nothing. “I’ll set the whole hallway on fire. I have matches in my hand and I’m not afraid to use them.” He curled his fingers tighter into his empty palms. “You think Logan’ll be happy about the smoke alarms going off while he’s working?”

The voice on the other side of the door was much, much closer as it mumbled, “We don’t have smoke alarms.”

Virgil felt a victorious smile pull at his mouth. _There he is._  “Then make some up, Fairy Godbother- _or_ you could open the door and we won’t have to worry about fire at all.”

The silence returned, and for a fleeting moment, Virgil was worried Roman had just returned to his desk and left him hovering outside the door like a very frustrated moron...

...until the door creaked open, bit by bit and with crying protests from its hinges, revealing a frowning prince whose gaze fell immediately to Virgil’s empty hands. “You don’t have matches,” Roman scowled. 

“Oh, no, I must have dropped them somewhere,” Virgil deadpanned, shoving his hands into the pockets of his hoodie. “Pity. But now that you’re here, get out of your room.”

The creative Side’s eyes narrowed further; Virgil didn’t miss the light crescent moons under his eyes, the disheveled state of his wavy hair, the way his body was tilted from the door’s opening as if he’d slam it shut any second, but the anxious Side stayed quiet and kept his eyes trained expectantly on Roman’s. 

“Why?” the prince asked finally. 

Virgil blinked at him, raising a single eyebrow. “I hate to be the first to let you know, Princey, but you need sunshine to stay healthy. Vitamin D and all that. So unless you have a fully functional sun hanging from your bedroom ceiling, you need to get out here and come get ice cream with me.”

 _Bingo_. Roman’s tired eyes lit up, and the door fell open as he stepped closer to the hallway. “Why are you getting ice cream?” 

“...because I want ice cream?” 

Virgil could see the gears turning in that royal head, curiosity and skepticism shining through Roman’s gaze. “Why do you want me to come with you?”

“Why are you so full of questions today?” Roman just frowned again. Virgil sighed, dramatic enough that he was sure the creative Side was impressed under all that suspicion, and turned to walk away, sending one final, resigned glance over his shoulder. “I guess I’ll just go by myself then, all alone, no one else, all the ice cream to myself-”

“Wait- I didn’t say no!” Roman cried indignantly. 

Virgil gave him a triumphant smirk. “Get dressed and meet me downstairs.” 

“I am dressed.”

“Roman Sanders, we are not getting ice cream with you dressed like you’re about to sing something from Into the Woods.”

There was that indignant pout again. “It’s the Mindscape, no one will care-”

“I care. I’m leavin’ in five minutes,” Virgil called in a singsong voice, holding in a laugh as Roman scoffed behind him. 

(Truthfully, he knew Roman would feel better when he got out of that prince uniform he’d no doubt been wearing since he’d started his three-day work flood, but Virgil wasn’t about to get sappy and say that.) 

Three minutes later - and with a lot of disgruntled grumbling - Roman made his way down the stairs, uniform replaced with a striped sweater and dark red skinny jeans, his hair still a craze of unkempt waves (at least he still looked good with messy hair; if Virgil didn’t at least run his hand through his tangles, it just looked like a bird misplaced her nest onto his head). He stopped at the bottom of the steps to glare at Virgil, though the anxious Side noticed the tension had all but dissipated from his shoulders.

“Is this up to your standards, you bitter little bat?” Roman said, gesturing to his outfit, nose in the air. 

“Good enough.” Virgil didn’t bother to smother his crooked grin as Roman’s scowl narrowed. “Let’s go, I wanna get some ice cream before it’s dark out.”

They filed out the door and onto the sidewalk, walking in silence for a bit as they both took in the early spring weather; the breeze felt nice compared to the stuffy air in the house, even if it was still in the early seventies (stupid Florida weather), and the sun was partially shaded by gray clouds that hung heavy in the sky with the promise of rain. Virgil took a deep breath of floral-laden air and tried to savor its refreshment. 

“I could have just summoned some ice cream,” Roman said suddenly, quietly. 

Virgil glanced at him, one eyebrow quirked, though he didn’t pause his easy stroll. “Did you not want to come?”

“No, I did, I did, just...” The prince scrunched his mouth to the side. “I know you’re just doing this to get me out of my room.” Virgil didn’t respond; he just kept walking, and Roman leaned forward to put himself in the anxious Side’s deliberate view. “You didn’t have to.”

“I know.” 

Roman disappeared back into his peripheral. “Why did you?”

“Why did I what?”

“Get me out of my room.” Before Virgil could even think to answer, Roman tilted his head to the side, jumping to answer his own question. “Is it annoying when I do that? Where I don’t come out for a while? I know it’s annoying when I’m grumpy. I wasn’t grumpy, obviously- I was working, but I guess that can be annoying, too. Was Logan complaining about it again? Or did Patton make you check on me? Did-”

“Maybe I just wanted to see you, Princey.”

Roman’s mouth snapped shut. 

He stared at Virgil for a moment, eyes round, before he turned back to facing forward without a word, though the anxious Side saw him nodding slightly to himself. Virgil found it a bit unbelievable that it was such an outlandish reason to the prince, but Roman’s contemplative silence bordered on shocked nonetheless.

They walked like that, side by side and utterly quiet, until the little ice cream parlor came into view; though it fit neatly into the row of shops it was nestled among, its interior looked a little like what Virgil imagined an old drug store did, with a long bar at one wall and shelves of candy and souvenir items on the other, and checkered flooring that made his eyes hurt, just a little bit. Bubblegum-pink pinstripe accents lined the walls and colored the seat cushions around the parlor. The smell of chocolate and fruit flooded past Virgil and Roman as they pulled the door open and shuffled in - Virgil just barely caught the tiny smile that lit up Roman’s face, but he was glad he saw it at all. 

After they ordered their ice cream and got situated, Roman turned to him, that smile still a shadow on his lips. “Thank you,” he said with an air of decisiveness. 

“For what?”

He shrugged. “Caring. I know Pat and Lo care, too, but thanks for dragging me out of my room. I needed to take a break.”

“Yeah, no kidding,” Virgil snorted; Roman elbowed him. “Ow- you’re welcome!” 

The laugh that echoed throughout the parlor as Roman shook his head was like music, an exasperated but lighthearted chuckle that dripped with relief, like seeing the sun after weeks of rain - the prince’s smile wasn’t too far from the comparison, in Virgil’s eyes. 

Not to be sappy or anything. 

The man behind the counter - a thin-face old man whose eyes twinkled with joy and secrets, the trademark look of an old soul who knew enough about life to see its beauty everywhere - handed them their orders in small glass bowls with a beaming smile; Roman gave a quick “Thank you!” and set to digging out the brownie pieces in his ice cream; when Virgil went to nod his own thanks, the man caught his eye, glancing between the pair before him and winking. He was attending to another group of customers farther down the bar before Virgil could formulate a response. 

“Boring old chocolate,” Roman laughed, either ignoring or not noticing the smattering of red across the anxious Side’s face as he tried to focus on his ice cream. “You can get any flavor you want and you get _chocolate_?”

“It’s dark,” he defended, “like my soul.”

“Okay, edgelord.”

Virgil pointed an accusing spoon at Roman’s glass bowl, eyes narrowed. “You got chocolate, too.”

“Ex _cuse_  you,” Roman gasped, a hand over his heart, so utterly betrayed - it was nice to see the drama back in the creative Side’s personality, even if Virgil had to resist the urge to roll his eyes. “This is brownie delight, you fool, and it is _leagues_ above your measly chocolate!”

“It sounds like chocolate that’s trying too hard.”

“You sound like chocolate that’s trying too hard-” 

Virgil dug his spoon into Roman’s ice cream and shoved it in the prince’s mouth, stopping the insult with a victorious smile. “Just shush and enjoy your ice cream, yeah?” 

Through a mouthful of spoon and ice cream, Roman muttered something that sounded a little like ‘duck you’.

They fell into a comfortable quiet after that, eating their ice cream to the soft, jazzy tune playing and easy babble of other customers in the parlor. Virgil watched the spring sunshine drift through the windows and onto the checkered floor with idle interest, watched as it colored the white tiles a hazy gold and the black a dark, faded purple-y hue. 

“Did you mean what you said earlier?” Roman said abruptly; Virgil’s eyes shifted to the prince’s curious gaze. “About just wanting to see me?”

“Of course I meant it.” 

Another beat of silence. “Is there... a reason?”

Virgil blinked at him, taking a slow spoonful of his ice cream before answering. “It gets annoyingly quiet without your annoyingly loud personality,” he said, but before Roman could react, he added quickly, “and maybe I missed your annoying face.”

That annoying face broke out in a smile, a shining beam that lit up the parlor just as much as the sunshine through the window and made the heat return to Virgil’s face all over again, though not unpleasantly so. Roman hummed in response and turned back to his ice cream. “Well, I’ll try to show my annoying face a little more often then.” 

And as the jazz tune overhead faded to the next, and the group of chattering customers smiled through their own conversations, and the man behind the counter held that knowing twinkle in his eye still, Virgil felt a smile pull at his lips, too. 

“I wouldn’t mind that at all.”


End file.
